WELCOME BACK to Interviews With Experts. This week I talk with Jason Falls (the founder of Social Media Explorer)–and it’s all about brevity. 1 simple question, 1 simple answer. And instead of getting his opinions on the broad strokes of Social Media, I asked Jason if he would mind focusing just on LinkedIn–because I know that kind of insight is invaluable to SBEs trying to grow their businesses through Company Pages, and professional word-of-mouth.

Dan Gallo: In your expert opinion, what’s the best tip leveraging the LinkedIn platform you can give the average Small Business to help grow their company? I know a lot of readers & small businesses out there could really use some LinkedIn advice…

Jason Falls: Well, for LinkedIn, the best thing you can do is search for the types of people that can help your business–either suppliers, vendors or even customers–and take about 10 minutes a week to send 4-5 notes to the people you find to say something like, “It looks like we might be able to help one another here. Love to hop on a call to chat about it.” Sure, it’s an old-school sales letter, but because you’ve got a footprint on LinkedIn for them to investigate, you’ll get some level of conversion rate–even if it’s low–and you’ll find yourself making connections that can help your business.

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I’d like to thank Jason for taking the time to talk with me. I find this type of input from a known expert the most valuable, most instantly actionable content we could possibly publish. For those of you taking Jason’s advice, please write me and tell me how it’s working. (BTW, my Business Development VP put Jason’s advice into action and is already getting results. Next week I’m meeting the CEO of a prospect while at a trade show in Vancouver.)

We’ve got more Interviews on the way soon with Mark Schaefer, John Paul Agular, and many more Experts of all kinds–all for the benefit of your SBE.

And as always: Running a Small Business is a long-distance journey–stop trying to do it alone!